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The Sustainable Youth Internship program takes an immersive approach to environmental education, offering yearlong internships to 150 high school students at 10 Title 1 public schools in the San Francisco Bay Area, serving a total student population of 20,000 students. The internships promote team-work and project-based learning, preparing students for college and environmental careers by connecting low-income youth with their local environments. Student teams at each school use science and technology to research and address pressing issues in their campuses and communities, engaging their peers in protecting watersheds from litter and runoff pollution, restoring creek native habitats, preventing marine debris or fighting air pollution and its impact on human health. Each school team is led by an Earth Team professional educator acting as a Campus Coordinator, working with teachers to connect in-class curriculum with afterschool service learning projects in collaboration with partner and community organizations.

The current status of small but important water bodies such as creeks in Contra Costa County is unclear. A variety of impacts can cumulatively stress our urban creeks and other aquatic systems and impair their beneficial functions. Nonpoint source pollution from the land that can flow into creeks include...Read more

The Zero Litter Project takes a service learning approach to leverage the creativity, passion, and leadership of today’s youth toward a healthier watershed. Students partner with school districts, municipalities, local organizations, businesses, and concerned citizens to collect data and employ strategies that reduce litter sources, raise community awareness, and complete...Read more

The Restoration Action Project is a curriculum-connected project designed to educate middle and high school classes in local restoration projects. The program consists of three or more class visits and two or more field days, and is often used to fulfill service-learning project requirements and to give classes opportunities to...Read more

People love to plant trees. It's physical, team oriented and the results are highly visible. These traits are a good place to start when designing any project for any audience, but especially relatable to students who often spend more time in a chair, working alone in a class that may...Read more